bwm30

I enjoyed tonights episode and it was great! It opened new opportunities and makes me wonder what will happen when they all return to FTL. I don't know why all the backlash, but I hope everyone can put it to rest before its too late.

DigificWriter

Not based on the credits, they aren't. In addition to those 5, you've got Henry, Hook, Belle, and Ruby, and of that group, it seems to me - based on recaps I've read and whatnot - as if Ruby's the only character who's been sort of in the background.

Anyway, back on topic.

GrhmLz

Lana, Robert, Jennifer, Ginny, and Josh are considered like the 'leads' amongst the main cast. The OUAT story started off and centered around their characters and then branched off. Yes, characters like Hook, Belle, and Ruby were given regular status, so they are all listed together, but they aren't the main core characters. They were added on and their status changed for S2.

ring of fire

That's the regular cast. You can be a regular and still be a secondary character. The lead five are still the same people. They are the ones in the posters and the ones who have been the most important since the beginning.



I know some people aren't happy but I have seen that a lot of them feel this way because of shipper reasons and I consider those reasons to be silly. Unless it's a show like Grey's Anatomy or Gossip Girl you can't think a show from a shipper's perspective and only that.
Please don't get me wrong I know it's not your case

Also the first nine episodes were the ones who drove most people away. Episode 7 and 8 had the big dips in the ratings.

And like I said I know more screentime doesn't equal quality storylines. I said some fans aren't happy with Snow, Rumpel, Regina, etc storylines but they are still the lead cast.

GrhmLz

Actually, the first nine episodes {with the exception of Ruby's centric which dipped to a 2.7 but then it went back up again to 3.1 for the remaining episodes in the first half of the season} were all consistently above or at 3.0 {still very good}. The highest of the season was the premiere.

The Ratings didn't significantly drop until after the fall hiatus and after The Cricket Game. The Cricket Game gave us our last 3.1 rating of the season and then to the next episode dropped to a 2.8. Everything after that went on the decline below that and down to the low 2's. And it hasn't picked back up since.

DigificWriter

Regarding the ratings, yes there's been a decline, but unless I've seen incomplete data, the decline isn't so significant that it's put the show' s future in jeopardy. The decline is disappointing and disconcerting in that you never want a show's ratings to decrease, but that's the only reason at this point to fret over what's been happening with regards to the ratings.

IceKat055

Endless extended hiatuses and patchy, inconsistent writing will always lead to a ratings decline. Many viewers have the attention span of 2-year-old sheep. If the writing can't keep them engaged, they fall off in droves.

Lost was a more ambitious story, IMO, but it too had inconsistent writing from an incompetent writing staff. They managed to lose 10M viewers over the course of that series. OUaT didn't have the luxury of starting out with that many viewers, so they need to be very careful not to tip the boat too far to one side or the other.

I hope they don't go too far with the "everyone is connected to everyone else" theme in this. Tamara setting up August leads to stalking/becoming involved with Neal leads to her being romantically entangled with Owen who was trapped in Storybrooke as a boy and lost his father there and spent 28 years trying to find it again and now finally has and is back for his father and is working with Tamara who is with Neal who is Emma's ex-con/boyfriend and baby-daddy who also happens to be back in SB and is Rumple's long-lost son...

It's just too tiresome at this point. I can't care. Bedtime. Maybe I'll care in the morning.

ring of fire

Still 2.7 and 2.8 were the first episodes to go under 9 million viewers. IMO people started getting bored with Emma & Snow being in another place. The lowest rated episode was 2.13 and the ratings went a little bit up with 2.14 and 2.16.

I don't mind the ratings as long as the show isn't in danger. IMO ratings don't equal quality. Most of the highest rated tv shows are crap for me.

And we might disagree on the reasons why some fans stopped watching but it's ok. I think the constant breaks didn't help this season.

GrhmLz

The ratings are still passable for a S3 but it's disconcerting because if the trend continues, more people could tune out and leave. It will eventually become a problem, even if right now it might not be.

Like, for example, S1 had some dives, the lowest ratings around 2.8 and 2.9 but there appeard to be bounces back, like towards the last two episodes of that season {3.0 and 3.3). And then viewers even came back after the summer hiatus, giving us a strong 3.9 into starting S2. We bounced back in the first half of the season after the 2.7 drop but no bounce back since the 2.8 drop this part of the season. It kept going down, not back up.

I don't know, I just hope the writing improves for next season.

Anyway ... Back to the episode.

I gather Emma will be the first to get suspicious regarding Tamara and nobody is going to believe her?!

DigificWriter

While we're still on the subject of ratings and overall viewership, In the Name of the Brother appears to be the point at which viewers truly started to 'tune out'. As of tonight, that was only 6 episodes ago, and there are still enough viewers watching the series overall to make the ratings decline merely disappointing and disconcerting rather than dangerous and endangering.

Edit: Regarding Tamara, I got the impression that August either said or started to say her name right before he turned inanimate, meaning that Emma and Co. know something's up with her but are missing precise details as to what that something is. I could be wrong, but that's the impression I was left with by the end of the ep.

Jamie Choate

It's a shame how lazy and predictable this show has become.

JeRoMe

It's a Young Angela Bassett!!

bwm30

Agreed! Why is it that only genre shows get all this backlash flack while every medical drama, primetime soap, and procedural cop show get all the attention, even when they fall into this trouble? There's too many of those on tv now and they're all the same. All genre shows break from that and give great entertainment. I don't need anymore medical dramas or cop procedurals; I want more shows like OUAT, Grimm, Arrow, Person of Interest, etc.

DigificWriter

Would you mind explaining how it's become 'lazy and predictable'?

ring of fire

I'm a huge Fringe fan and the show had the lowest ratings ever

I'm so tired of procedural and dumb comedies. I don't watch any of them but I'm not surprised they are so successful. It's really easy to watch them and you don't have to follow any storyline.

One of the main reasons why serialized shows do great on cable it's because they don't get breaks. People don't mind waiting months as long as they get the entire season without any breaks or just one break.